Murder of Bock Tuan Thong

On 2 April 2004, at a carpark in Boon Keng, 56-year-old Bock Tuan Thong, a scrap car dealer, was found dead in the car boot of his brother's car. The man was found with stab wounds on his legs and his face was badly beaten. The police classified the case as murder and investigations began. Bock was survived by his wife and his 15-year-old son.[1] Bock's widow Tan Ai Wah said her husband was a friendly man and she did not understand why she was killed. Bock's friends were also shocked to hear about his death.[2] At least four people stated that they witnessed the victim being abducted and assaulted by a group of few men, and a friend of Bock stated that while he was calling Bock, the phone call suddenly came to an abrupt end and he heard some harsh words, signalling to him that something happened to Bock before his death.[3]

Three days later, a coffee shop helper named Lim Poh Lye, aged 44, surrendered himself to the police. He confessed that he was one of the three people that tried to rob Bock after abducting him, but it ended with the death of Bock. His two accomplices, who ran off to Malaysia, were identified as Ng Kim Soon and Tony Koh Zhan Quan.[4][5]

Lim was charged with murder on 7 April 2004, two days after he surrendered himself. If found guilty of murder, Lim would be sentenced to death.[6] The police placed the names of Ng and Koh on the wanted list, and asked for the help of Malaysian authorities to trace their whereabouts.

Ten weeks after the case, on 18 May 2004, 36-year-old Tony Koh, who ran off to Malaysia with Ng, surrendered himself to the Royal Malaysia Police in Kuala Lumpur.[7][8] On 22 May 2004, Koh was extradited back to Singapore and became the second suspect to be charged with murder two days later. Koh, who worked as a freelance Taoist priest, was divorced and also listed as a person with undischarged bankruptcy since 1997. However, the third and final suspect, 43-year-old Ng Kim Soon, was never caught despite the authorities' efforts to trace his whereabouts and bring him to justice.[9][10]

In February 2005, the prosecution filed an appeal against the trial verdict,[32] seeking to overturn the two men's convictions of robbery with hurt and asked that the murder charges be restored after arguing that the trial judge had erred in law to acquit Koh and Lim of murder and cited that it was irrelevant to determine the purpose of stabbing Bock, as the more crucial question was whether there was an intention to inflict the knife wounds and whether the injury inflicted was sufficient to cause death, and also cited the common intention of the trio to commit armed robbery.[33][34][35]

On 15 July 2005, the Court of Appeal delivered its verdict after hearing the appeal in March 2005. The three judges - Chao Hick Tin, Lai Kew Chai and Tay Yong Kwang - stated that in view of the evidence, there was no doubt that the two defendants Tony Koh and Lim Poh Lye had committed murder. Although they genuinely never had the intent to kill and only wanted to rob, the stabbing of the victim Bock Tuan Thong was made in furtherance of the common intention to commit armed robbery. The three judges noted that per the arguments of Senior State Counsel Lawrence Ang, who assisted the prosecution, the definition of murder did not necessarily meant an act where the offender intends to cause the death of his victim, but it is also considered an offence of murder if an offender intentionally inflict injuries on his victim and such that the harm caused was sufficient to cause death, pursuant to Section 300(c) of the Penal Code.[36]

Turning to the case of Lim, the three judges found that even though it was not clear whether the third man Ng Kim Soon participated in the stabbing and whether it was Lim or Ng who inflicted the fatal wound, there was no dispute that Lim had participated in the stabbing and irrespective to whoever was responsible for the injury that caused Bock to die, these injuries caused by Lim and possibly Ng were intentional and such that one of the wounds cut through the femoral artery and resulted in the death of Bock due to excessive blood loss. Based on these findings, the Court of Appeal held that Lim was therefore guilty of murder.[37]

Turning to the case of Koh, the three-judge panel stated that prior to the abduction of Bock, Koh had prepared the knives in accordance to their plan to rob Bock. They deemed that Koh had the knowledge that the knives would be used during the robbery, and he also shared the common intention with both Ng and Lim to commit armed robbery. The victim was also stabbed in order to carry the trio's common intention. Therefore, the Court of Appeal held that Koh was also guilty of murder.[38]

As a result, the Court of Appeal allowed the prosecution's appeal, and found both 45-year-old Lim Poh Lye and 38-year-old Tony Koh Zhan Quan guilty of the original charges of murder, and sentenced both men to death, effectively overruling the trial decision and overturning both men's jail terms and robbery convictions.[39][40] It was reported that Bock's wife accepted the verdict and she expressed that she would visit her husband's resting place to inform him of the appeal ruling.[41]

Changi Prison Complex, where Koh and Lim were hanged after their nine-month stay on death row.

While they were held on death row at Changi Prison, both Tony Koh Zhan Quan and Lim Poh Lye made another appeal to overturn their death sentences. Their lawyers argued that the prosecution had only the right to appeal in cases where they opposed an defendant's sentence or acquittal, and that both men were not acquitted of murder, since the original murder charges were merely reduced to lesser offences of robbery with hurt and the men were convicted of lower charges, and there was no pronouncement of an acquittal by the trial court. However, the Court of Appeal agreed with the prosecution that the trial judge had found both Lim and Koh not guilty of murder, which was equivalent to an acquittal. Therefore, they dismissed the appeal.[42][43][44][45]

After losing their final legal motion to escape the gallows, both Lim and Koh petitioned for presidential clemency to commute their sentences of death to life in prison. However, then President of Singapore S. R. Nathan refused to pardon both men and rejected their petitions on 10 April 2006. Reportedly, Lim's nine-year-old son, who had been visiting his father in jail, was unaware of his father's upcoming execution, which was scheduled to be carried out 18 days later on 28 April 2006. This was concealed by Lim's brothers and other relatives for fear of making the boy sad (since Lim and his son shared a very close father-son relationship), and they planned to tell the child that his father fell sick in prison and died once they made preparations to conduct Lim's funeral after his hanging.[46]

On 28 April 2006, 46-year-old Lim Poh Lye and 39-year-old Tony Koh Zhan Quan were both hanged at dawn in Changi Prison. Also, even after Koh was executed, his bankruptcy remains undischarged and the banks still had the right to claim his family's assets, and he still owed about S$8,000 to his creditors as of May 2007 (a year after Koh died).[47][48][49]

In January 2006, K S Rajah, a former judicial commissioner in Singapore, wrote about the case in a legal essay, citing the concern that both Koh and Lim were placed in double jeopardy since they were tried for the same offence by both the trial court and appellate court.[50][51]

Singaporean crime show Crimewatch re-enacted the case in October 2005, and it aired on television as the eighth episode of the show's annual season.[52]

Two months after Lim and Koh were hanged, another crime show True Files also re-enacted the case and aired it as the 12th episode of the show's fourth season on 18 June 2006. To protect the identity of both Lim and Koh, their real-life police mugshots were not revealed on-screen. The former lawyers of Koh and Lim, Ismail Hamid (who represented Lim) and both Loo Ngan Chor and Julian Tay (who both represented Koh) were approached for an interview in the episode, and they stated that both men were remorseful for having caused the death of Bock and stated their plan was merely to rob rather than taking his life.[53]

The cases of Lim and Koh were regarded as one of the rare examples where the Court of Appeal increased an offender's jail term to a death sentence in Singapore, and these cases also include Chia Kee Chen and Kho Jabing, whose life sentences were overturned and replaced with capital punishment for murder. Both of them were since executed; Kho was confirmed to be hanged on 20 May 2016, after he lost his final appeal to commute his sentence.[54][55][56]

As of today, Ng Kim Soon, the final accomplice of the murder, remains on the run for masterminding the robbery and murder of Bock Tuan Thong.[57]

• Capital punishment in Singapore